


miss you in the june gloom, too

by water_poet



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath, Anger, Angst, Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie) Spoilers, Black Panther Shuri (Marvel), But I won't, Crying, Ficlet Collection, Grief/Mourning, Hopeful Ending, Hurt No Comfort, Lots of Crying, Minor Bucky Barnes/Steve Rogers, Not A Fix-It, Pain, Poetic, Post-Avengers: Infinity War Part 1 (Movie), Tony Stark Has A Heart, a shit ton of italics, and it's fucking shattered, hahaha - Freeform, i should stop titling my fics after FOB lyrics, join me and be sad together, this is really just me being sad after IW
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-21
Updated: 2018-06-21
Packaged: 2019-05-26 12:27:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,491
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15000884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/water_poet/pseuds/water_poet
Summary: Shuri mournsThor regretsNat remembersBruce wondersSteve recallsRocket waitsNebula feelsTony seethes





	miss you in the june gloom, too

**Author's Note:**

> have you ever been unable to leave a theater because you're crying too hard

_"I hope they remember you"_

* * *

She is not a leader.  
  
She is not a warrior.  
  
She is not a queen.  
  
But she loves her people, and she loves her brother even as the warm summer winds scatter his soul endlessly across the plains and savannas of Africa.  
  
"I'm not ready" she tells Okoye.  
  
"Neither am I, princess" she replies, clutching her fist to her chest as if desperate to keep his memory locked in her heart.  
  
"It shouldn't be me" she insists.   
  
Okoye stares out at the crowds outside the palace, draped in mourning robes and carrying all manner of gifts towards the hastily erected memorial.   
  
"No. But it must be" she says.  
  
Shuri stares at the setting sun. Her mouth is dry with a thousand words she wishes she'd never said, and a thousand more she wishes she had.  
  
He had not been there, on the plain, amidst the shifting skies and the scent of the wild beyond.   
  
She's nearly seventeen and she'll still believe in fairytales if it will bring him back.   
  
This strength will never be hers.   
  
She wears it like a cloak, like a jewel, like the suit that fits her perfectly and yet feels so wrong.   
  
It is not hers to keep, just as it was not his to lose.  
  
They crown her Shuri, Queen of Wakanda.  
  
She is not a queen.

* * *

Never in all his life had he felt old.  
  
In the days of his youth, rosy and gay against the glittering towers of Asgard, he never dreamed of the tug of wrinkles on his forehead, nor the ache of a withering heart.  
  
As was often, he had been wrong in those hazy, golden days.  
  
Age started and ended with a broken heart.  
  
He lost his parents, his home, his people, and his dearest friend and brother.  
  
He had nothing left, but he gave it up anyway.  
  
Somewhere, he felt comfort.  
  
His kin and his people were in Valhalla, enjoying the rewards of their lives and heroic deeds.  
  
He gave the rabbit his axe and felt something like joy when the tiny creature accepted the weapon and held onto it for dear life.  
  
The sun shines down on him from the balcony of the palace.  
  
He closes the blinds and weeps silently.

* * *

She'd never lost a friend.  
  
She tells herself she still hasn't, even now, as the skies pour and she tries to believe that she can't cry anymore.  
  
It had started raining on the walk back.  
  
Bruce had tumbled out of the Hulk-Buster and into her arms like a lost child.  
  
In his pain, she found consolation.  
  
She did as she had always done: ignore the ache in her throat and talk sense into the world.  
  
This time, the world was Bruce, because it seemed pointless to shout at the stars until they gave back her lost ~~friends~~ colleagues.  
  
She wonders if Clint is alright.

* * *

 It's never been so quiet in his head, and his half misses the roars and shouts and endless white noise.

Natasha holds his hand and they sit for hours, not speaking.  
  
He doesn't feel as if he's got a right to suffer.  
  
He's lost no one. He had no one to lose.  
  
It wasn't fair. If he could have traded, saved the soldier or the king or the witch, he would have. His own life had never felt so undeserved.  
  
She knows what he's thinking, and she squeezes his hand.  
  
"Don't" she says, "We need you"  
  
He doesn't believe her, and she doesn't try to convince him. She knows better.  
  
He wonders if this is how karma is repaying him.  
  
Happiness had never really been his thing.  
  
He thought back to the streets of Calcutta, to the battle for New York and Sokovia. It all felt like a lifetime ago, and maybe it really was.  
  
Somewhere in the back of his mind, The Other Guy makes an unidentifiable noise.   
  
Bruce realizes he's crying and wipes at his face.  
  
The Other Guy pretends not to notice.

* * *

He'd been in love twice, and neither time had ended the way they deserved.  
  
He hadn't said a word on the walk back to the city. He just clenched his fists and let Natasha guide him.  
  
He couldn't seem to bring himself to feel any pain.  
  
Maybe he was simply used to it, now.  
  
Years and years of failures and disappointments had hardened him, somewhere deep down.   
  
It had all been too good to be true, and he felt it was hardly ironic that fate had snatched away the person he loved most just moments after he'd had him again.  
  
He watches the stars and cries without knowing it.  
  
The soon-to-be-queen sits beside him and tells him a legend, a bedtime story her brother used to read to her when they were children. She holds his hand and traces a pattern in the sky. The stars line up and he sees a wolf's eyes staring into his.  
  
The White Wolf watches, and Steve Rogers misses him.

* * *

Children were beyond him.  
  
Friends were behind him.  
  
Hope was beneath him.  
  
And yet he'd lost all three, before even realizing he'd had them in his paws the whole time.  
  
"Dad?"  
  
_Dad._  
  
He'd never asked to be made.  
  
He'd never believed in a god either.  
  
But now he was praying to both, a maker and a god, begging for whatever powers the universe still held to tear him apart so he could finally return to the mud and sky where he belonged.  
  
The god had given him his axe, with little more than a sad smile and a gentle nod.  
  
If he closed his eyes, sometimes he thought he could still hear the hollow, wooden heartbeat.  
  
Or maybe he was simply hearing his own for the first time.

* * *

She had never _felt_ before.  
  
At the very least, she had never been allowed to do so, under penalty of torture.  
  
Her real father, from eons ago, when her life was new and her heart was still beating in her chest, had told her stories of warriors and titans and kings.  
  
She had laughed and smiled, but maybe it was simply out of respect for her father. After all, they were just stories. They didn't really _mean_ anything.  
  
When her mother died, she didn't cry. Her father promised it was just the way things were, and that everything would work out. Her mother was in a better place, so there was no sense in crying.  
  
When her planet burned before her eyes, she felt her blood boil and her face redden as tears streamed down her face.  
  
The Titan who called himself her father had gripped her shoulder as the fire roared, assuring her this was the way things were meant to be.  
  
She'd dried her tears and vowed to never cry again.  
  
But then, when she'd learned the only person she'd ever loved had perished at the hands of a monster, she wept.  
  
Her screams echoed across the desolate planet, and she cried tears she didn't know she had.  
  
She'd wanted to die every goddamn day since she first became the Titan's daughter.   
  
She dug one of her blades into the earth and said a silent prayer, wondering if there really was anything so merciful as death out in the cold abyss of the universe.  
  
The golden-orange stone set into the handle of the knife gleams, and she starts.  
  
She's feeling something. It's light and dangerous, like a toxic gas threatening to lift her up into the air only to slam her back down and shatter what bones remained in her body.  
  
She thinks it might be hope.

* * *

"We had a son. It was so real"  
  
He'd had a son.  
  
He was real.  
  
He _is_ real.  
  
He pounds the ground with his fists and barks something at his only companion.  
  
For the first time since the kid, he wants to die.  
  
Unthinking, blinded by his rage-filled sobs, he lunges for a metal shard to end the nightmare.  
  
The assassin grabs him and hold him back with inhuman strength.  
  
"You cannot save him dead" she says, not unkindly.   
  
Tiny stops, and she lets him collapse again, this time sitting beside him. The suns of Titan are setting, and Tony watches them, wondering if he) had gotten to see a glimpse before it all crumbled away.  
  
The assassin stands and offers her hand, her face stern and worn and compassionate.  
  
"We need to leave"   
  
Tony's hand fists into the dirt, into the remains of everything that had mattered to him.  
  
"I can't" he chokes.  
  
Nebula kneels and grabs one of his hands.  
  
"They're not here, Stark. They are safe"  
  
He looks up.  
  
"How do we get them?" he breathes.  
  
For a brief moment, a hint of a smile plays on Nebula's lips, as if she doesn't quite remember how to do it properly.  
  
"There is a way"

* * *

_"If we can't protect the earth, you can be damn sure we'll avenge it"_

**Author's Note:**

> Marvel bring my children back or I stg I will shove your fucking gauntlet up your goddamn ass


End file.
